Run And Gun On 33rd Street?

It's unlikely Donnie Walsh will let his search for the next Knicks' coach drag on any longer than necessary, and do not construe this as an endorsement of any particular candidate, but you, dear Knick fan, would not be ill-served by the presence of Mike D'Antoni on your team's bench come November.

Sure, there is the belief that high-octane, run-run-run basketball can't win in the playoffs. The Showtime Lakers did it, but not many others in the last generation or so. And there is the notion that D'Antoni is a one-trick pony.

But let's quibble, since that's what these blogs are for, or so they tell me.

First, in basketball, as in most things, it's not what you do, it's how you do it, and there's no one way to do anything.

An uptempo offensive team can certainly win if its commitment to that style is strong enough. And let's tell the truth here: It takes at least as much discipline to run a great, organized fast break on every possession as it does to run a great halfcourt offense. It's pretty easy to walk it up when fatigue sets in. The committed team won't.

Second, if key members of the Suns don't leave their bench during the altercation with the Spurs in the 2007 playoffs, the Suns, defensively challenged to be sure, might be defending NBA champs right now and we're not even having this discussion.

Third, the guy who let those Lakers run free, Pat Riley, came to New York and, because of the (less talented) material he was working with, played a completely different -- and, I might add, less attractive -- game. The appeal was that the Knicks won with it, and wins, as we all know, provide quite a bit of absolution.

So, can or would D'Antoni come up with a way for his team to play that's not the "Seven seconds or less" that he's favored in Phoenix? We'd have to see. I doubt anyone sitting in an NBA head coach's chair only has one trick in his bag.

(We should also dismiss the notion here that the Lakers played no defense during their glory years. The great Hubie Brown, when describing the vaunted Laker halfcourt trap, still breaks out in a cold sweat all these years later.)

Fourth, D'Antoni's Suns teams have been consistent 50-game-or-more winners the last four seasons. Before Knick fans start worrying about whether D'Antoni's style can win in the playoffs, how about the team gets there first?

You say there's no Steve Nash, Boris Diaw or Amare Stoudemire on the Knick roster? OK. Fair point. But whoever takes over the Knicks is going to have to bide his time until Walsh can overhaul this sorry excuse of a squad. An uptempo team might be a little more fun to watch in the interim.

More than likely, by the time you read this, D'Antoni will have realized the Knicks won't be able to retool fast enough to obtain players who suit his style, so he'll probably cast his lot with the Bulls. Walsh will turn his attention to back to Mark Jackson and Avery Johnson and that will be that.

But tell me right now, long-suffering Knick fan, that a 55-win regular-season doesn't look great from where you're sitting? You know you can't.